the paul ryan bill, had it become law, and done something useful. but you will notice that it did not. the american people had this debate during the political campaign just concluded. that what they wanted was not the paul ryan approach but it was the approach of president obama and other democrats. we had the election. the elections have consequences. that's not a joke. in this case, these consequences are extremely important to the debt future of the country. should. lead more -- should the president lead more? bill clinton did. it is a problem. remember, congress has to vote for every spending bill. it also has to vote to increase the debt ceiling. the president does not empower through the constitution to do those things unilaterally. host: explain wha the by policy -- what the bipartisan policy center is. guest: >> we are in washington, d.c. and we are bipartisan and not nonpartisan. we have democrats and republicans, former senators, former congressman, but mostly a lot of very senior staff who used to work for the white house and the senate